Dear All

A wee update courtesy of your "gardener", Graham Scott, as we enter the second year of planting and growing in the organic vegetable part -- the recreation part is under consideration, with work ongoing behind the scenes (quantity surveyor's costing being obtained as I type these lines).

Graham writes:
"... continuing to feed soil [with] seaweed, charcoal, horse and chicken manure, rockdust, liquid bokashi as well as dalek and commercial peat-based composts.

Peas and beans sown and starting to show.
Sugar snap peas were a favourite with the local kids last year.
Tatties: pink, fir apples and Epicure – strictly earlies this year. Plant spares in ton bags.
Onions and garlic went in before the snow.
Jerusalem and globe artichokes went in last month.
Buying in grafted, 'turbo' tomatoes, pumpkins (to get kids to plant), melons – all from Suttons

Sown: nasturtium, sweet peas, sunflowers, limminaria, pansy, several wild flower mixes;
French beans, Chantenay carrots, courgettes, basil, cut-and-grow salad mix.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/digin/
Planting plugged kohlrabi, spinach, brussels sprouts – from Cakebread's

Alkanet or dyers' bugloss (Alkanna tinctoria), from the borage family.
Photo taken on 3 May 2010, next door to the Community Garden,
where a couple of big plants also grow.

Herb garden has rhubarb, Alkanet or dyers' bugloss (Alkanna tinctoria), comfrey, burnet saxifrage, mecanopsis, yellow mullein, various mints, thyme, chives.

First flower of Mecanopsis Sheldonii, a true blue "poppy" from the Himalayas;
photo taken on 6th May 2010 in our garden.

Digging up butterbur; still removing shade-inducing branches from trees; lots of tidying up to do round site before growth kicks in (plastic, glass etc.).

Top end 'amenity' (recreation) area:
I have suggested apple, pear and damson plantings, and creating an 'edible wall' – see www.agroforestry.co.uk/ [– this will need to be discussed at a later date].

Between fence and burn – in part to discourage access – planting gooseberries, blackcurrent, worcestershireberries, rosa rugosa, rosa canina, honeysuckle.

Flood no. 9 - the video

As the rain is abating, the floodwaters are receding. Just after 1pm I took a wee 55-second video which I have posted to Youtube for all to see:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clwAS85t9v8

Lynnside Flood No. 9 - part 2

The saga continues:

 The young lady in these photos gingerly negotiated her way through the ankle-deep water by the strong metal fence. I asked her permission to photograph, which she granted with a big smile.

Flood no 9 - part 1

Hiya again
We're currently experiencing some heavy rains, but this is really only day two after a long spell of very dry weather so I'm surprised to see the burn overflowing already.
Here is a photo taken at 8:15 this morning:

And here is one taken just a few minutes ago, at 11:56AM -- not long now and the footpath will be fully submerged:

And indeed, by 12:25PM, the water flows across the footpath. The car park below the stone wall is half flooded now, also.

PS:
Just before I took the 11:56 photo above, I watched a boy, maybe twelve years old?, in dark-blue track pants and hooded sweat shirt squatting and standing on the edge of this side of the burn. He had climbed across the tall fence separating the Nelson Road housing estate (West Highland Housing Association property) from the burn and was holding on to the fence with one hand. How he got across the burn to the Miller Road side, I do not know. I actually didn't notice him until after I took this photograph, where you can just see him on the very edge of the picture on the right -- a tiny blue dot:

I shouted to the boy but he pretended not to pay any attention. My heart was racing as I watched him brace himself and then jump across the burn, which now flows in full spate along a narrow water channel.
The boy then very, very slowly clambered back over the fence, which is nearly as tall as he. He ambled back into the housing estate before disappearing around the corner of the house nearest the burn.
I tried to call the police but they're obviously busy dealing with flooding elsewhere...
Can I describe my feeling of helplessness as I watched this boy intent on a thrill?